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BY CHINONSO IHEKIRE
Nigerian singer, Efemena Mukoro better known as Blackmagic is back with a new album titled ‘Version 3.0’
Coming after a five-year no-album hiatus, the new body of work was recently released independently under his Based on Belief Entertainment.
Following his swift rise to stardom locally, one thing has stood out for Blackmagic; his refinement of sound. Easily perceived as one of the pioneers of the growing afro-fusion sound movement in Nigeria, or what is popularly mislabelled as ‘Alternative.’ His sound has always titled to an elegant cocktail of fast-paced rhythmic afro-pop, rhythm and blues and afro-beat.
Blackmagic’s previous projects ingrained the singer’s musical success in the Nigerian industry: Version 1.0 (2011), Version 2.0 (2013) and Black Friday (2015), with hits such as the afro-pop/r n b melange Repete, the Oritsefemi-assisted smash rap/pop single, Pass you by, the electrifying love melody, Wonder, and many others. It has been a romantic musical adventure between the creative musician and his teeming audience. And in many ways, Version 3.0 solidifies that.
Having been missing-in-action for four years – except momentary recent single releases such as No Need (2018), Anything for love (2019) – the latest 12-track album feels like a portrait of a fabled phoenix rising from her ashes.It is a delicious and soul gratifying 51-minutes of sound engineering from industry heavyweights likes Xela, Spax, Ikon and Bond, who craftily harmonise hip-hop drums with African guitar melodies, soft piano riffs and other sounds, to create sweet ‘milk-like’ sounds. Interestingly, as typical of Blackmagic, the project features only two collaborations from Afro-fusion singer, Tems and rapper Big Bad.
From the very beginning, you can identify Blackmagic’s succinct storytelling with his Tems-assisted opener, Soon, which typically apologises for his long musical absence and reveals that he was struggling internally with “catching inspiration”.
The singers lyrical dexterity is very evident in this project, with his use of symbolism to represent themes throughout the body of work; like in Koole, where he uses “NEPA just dey rest for the town, e no dey work/ generator vibrations louder than your thought,” to symbolise the extant epileptic power supply problem in the country.
You can also discover this in Ponmo, where he says “Based on road no good, our leaders need jet/ our youth is in a mess/ some dey thief pant and some na piano dem dey press/ Is that the reason Jesus wept”.
Born Efemena Mukoro also referred to as Ejay Blackmagic, Blackmagic is a Nigerian singer, rapper, and songwriter, who is well known for his funny raps style. His kind of music consist of Afrobeat, Hip-hop and Soul, which he blend to give fans that unique sound that keeps the head nodding all day.
The Delta State native attended the King’s College, Lagos, as well as studied Computer Science at the University of Benin. He started his music career at a very young age, with interest in rapping and singing. As he grew older, his interest in music also increased greatly and he had the opportunity to have direct access to cameras and recording equipment.
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